Inside Out 2: A wild emotional rollercoaster

Inside Out 2 (2024) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG, for no particular reason

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.16.24

Nobody could have expected this film to live up to its brilliant 2015 predecessor, which earned a well-deserved Oscar nomination for its ingenious script.

 

While Joy (yellow), Disgust (green) and Anger (red) watch with horror, Envy (turquoise)
and Anxiety (orange) seize control of their beloved Riley's behavior, with disastrous results.

But this sequel comes darn close, thanks to an equally clever narrative touch that establishes a solid reason to revisit these characters.

Recall, from the first film, that young Riley’s life was upended when her parents (voiced by Diane Lane and Kyle MacLachlan) moved them from the Midwest to San Francisco. This shattering adjustment taxed the skills of the emotional avatars in Riley’s noggin, who collaborate to keep her every thought and action (somewhat) under control: Joy (Amy Poehler), Anger (Lewis Black), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Tony Hale, taking over here for Bill Hader) and Disgust (Liza Lapira, similarly replacing Mindy Kaling).

 

Several years have passed, and Riley (Kensington Tallman) has become a well-adjusted middle-schooler: intelligent, kind-hearted, generous and blessed with a pair of inseparable besties: Grace (Grace Lu) and Bree (Sumayyah Nuriddin-Green). They do everything together; they’re also members of the school hockey team, where Riley is a shining star who — as the academic year concludes — has attracted the attention of talent scout Coach Roberts (Yvette Nicole Brown).

 

It has been smooth sailing for the emotions, and Joy — their de facto leader — is delighted by the way they’ve molded Riley into a “good person” via careful manipulation of their complex control panel.

 

Even so, the first hint of trouble concerns the means by which Joy has brought everyone to this happy moment: a classic case of good intentions destined to go awry.

 

But that comes later. Far more seriously, these five emotions are aroused one night from their slumber — Riley being similarly asleep — by the relentless soft beep-beep of a previously unnoticed red monitor light ... which suddenly erupts into a shrieking klaxon.

 

As it happens, Riley had just celebrated her 13th birthday. And that red button?

 

Puberty.

Let Him Go: Riveting, but flawed

Let Him Go (2020) • View trailer

3.5 stars. Rated R, for violence

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.6.20

Kevin Costner has matured well.

 

He projects an aura of calm self-assurance, leavened with a dry sense of humor, and a gaze that can shift — in a heartbeat — from tenderness to flinty anger. He excels at characters who may have yielded to baser instincts, back in the day, but who subsequently gained insight and patience … while retaining a hard edge.

 

Having traveled far in order to see their grandson again, Margaret (Diane Lane) and
George (Kevin Costner) are delighted when the little boy appears: a mere prelude
to what rapidly becomes an unselling situation.

He’s perfectly cast in the ongoing TV series Yellowstone, and the same is true of the role he plays here, in director/scripter Thomas Bezucha’s adaptation of Larry Watson’s 2013 novel. Let Him Go opens today in operational cinemas.

 

Bezucha’s treatment is long on characterization — particularly the quiet moments that define a relationship — and, regrettably, short on detail; the first act, in particular, omits all manner of necessary back-story, and leaves several key questions unanswered. One gets the impression that several expository scenes were left on the cutting-room floor.

 

Alternatively, this may have been deliberate; Bezucha focuses on his two protagonists, and how they respond first to tragedy, and later to an unexpected — and horrific — challenge. The genre is amorphous: equal parts thriller, mystery, latter-day Western and character drama, leavened with a subtle slice of social commentary.

 

At its core, though, this is a story about mothers and sons.

 

The setting is Montana, in the early 1960s. Retired sheriff George Blackledge (Costner) and his wife Margaret (Diane Lane) share their ranch home with their adult son James (Ryan Bruce), his wife Lorna (Kayli Carter), and the couple’s newborn baby, Jimmy. Margaret and James break horses for a living; the income is modest, but enough to keep them comfortable.

 

We sense that Lorna is an uncertain new mother, easily intimidated by the far more capable and assertive Margaret, who — in turn — isn’t sufficiently attentive to her daughter-in-law’s insecurities. Such subtleties hit the back burner when James suddenly dies of a broken neck, when thrown from his horse.

 

Bezucha abruptly flashes forward three years, to the day Lorna marries Donnie Weboy (Will Brittain). (Where did he come from? How did they meet?) Donnie joins the Blackledge household, but the fit feels wrong; Margaret’s suspicions are confirmed during a visit to town, when — unseen — she witnesses Donnie striking both Lorna and Jimmy (now played, alternately, by twins Bram and Otto Hornung).

 

Some brief period of time passes, at which point George and Margaret waken one morning to discover that Donnie, Lorna and Jimmy are gone, having departed in the middle of the night. (Why then? Given what subsequently transpires, why would Donnie have waited even a day to run off with his new family?)

Justice League: And so it begins...

Justice League (2017) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for sci-fi action and violence
By Derrick Bang

Seeing director Zack Snyder’s name attached to this film was not happy news, given the degree to which he ruined both 2013’s Man of Steel and last year’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

Having responded to the bat-signal illuminated by Police Commissioner Gordon (J.K.
Simmons, far left), the newly formed Justice League — from left, Wonder Woman (Gal
Gadot), Cyborg (Ray Fisher), Batman (Ben Affleck) and The Flash (Ezra Miller) —
learn that Gotham City is, once again, in serious trouble.

Snyder has much in common with director Michael Bay, similarly notorious for the Transformers franchise. Both favor bloated, soulless, humorless slugfests that wreak havoc on landscapes and cityscapes, while casually snuffing hundreds (thousands?) of civilian bystanders. Their films are the very definition of mindless product over art.

On the other hand, I was cheered to note Joss Whedon as co-scripter on Justice League. As the writer/director of 2012’s The Avengers, Whedon established the template for solid, successful superhero epics. Fans have recognized Whedon’s gift since television’s Buffy slayed her first vampire, back in 1996: He has an unerring talent for blending action fantasy with a (frequently droll) human element, which eases our suspension of disbelief.

And is a helluva lot more fun.

It’s easy to spot Whedon’s touch in Justice League, which is most successful during its first and second acts, as the stage is set, and the players assembled. It’s equally easy to see that the third act belongs to Snyder ... but not entirely. Even here, we get the vicarious relief of the unmistakable Whedon touch.

Justice League picks up in the immediate wake of Batman v Superman. The latter is dead, having perished at the hands of a Kryptonian monster genetically engineered by the villainous Lex Luthor. The country (the world?) is sliding quickly into anarchy, humanity apparently having abandoned hope after losing its gallant symbol for truth, justice and the American way.

(Ah ... but is Big Blue really, truly dead?)

Bruce Wayne (Batman) and Diana Prince (the Amazon Wonder Woman) are doing their best to stem the lawless tide, but they operate in the shadows; they’re not “living symbols” in the manner of Superman. Worse yet, Batman has been encountering winged “parademons” — very hard to kill — that seem to be seeking something.

Mindful of the need for additional super-powered allies, in order to hold off whatever comes next, Bruce and Diana reach out to three promising individuals: Barry Allen (Ezra Miller), a twentysomething nerd transformed by a lightning strike into The Flash; Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa), dubbed Aquaman, and heir to the underwater kingdom of Atlantis; and Victor Stone (Ray Fisher), a once-promising college football player nearly killed in a horrific accident, and “saved” when his scientist father Silas (Joe Morton) employed alien tech to transform his son into the biomechanical Cyborg.

Paris Can Wait ... but we'd rather not

Paris Can Wait (2016) • View trailer 
2.5 stars. Rated PG, for no particular reason
By Derrick Bang

Call this one My Dinner with Andre lite, and on the road. With an undercurrent of flirtatious tension.

When an ear infection prevents Anne (Diane Lane) from joining her husband Michael
(Alec Baldwin, left) on a quick business flight, their friend Jacques (Arnaud Viard) offers
to drive her instead.

That’s undoubtedly what writer/director Eleanor Coppola had in mind, with this unhurried, two-actor travelogue. And she should be grateful for the presence of star Diane Lane, who brings occasional charm to this sojourn through the French countryside.

Because, for the most part, watching this film is like being stuck in somebody’s living room, politely forced to endure vacation photos — and exhaustive commentary — for 92 minutes. The experience may be well intended and handsomely mounted, but the result is the same: restless boredom.

Along with a soupçon of mild irritation. After awhile, watching two people swoon over a series of mouth-watering, haute cuisine meals feels less like vicarious sharing, and more like smug showing off.

We meet Anne (Lane) in Cannes, where her Hollywood producer husband Michael (Alec Baldwin) has been deal-making; their next stop in Paris has just been derailed by his urgent need to manage a location shoot in Budapest. We get a sense that Anne, all tolerant smiles, has been neglected in the midst of all this chaos.

The quick trip to Hungary has been booked on a small private jet, but Anne is suffering from a mild ear infection; the pilot warns that cabin pressure could exacerbate this condition. She dithers; Michael’s business associate Jacques (Arnaud Viard) generously offers to drive her to Paris, where she can wait for her husband’s return.

It’s a marvelous idea; Jacques tosses her suitcase into the rear of his aging Peugeot convertible, and they embark on what should be a seven-hour drive. But Jacques, assuming the role of self-appointed ambassador of All Things France, never met a restaurant, cathedral, museum, roadside fruit stand, or set of Roman ruins that didn’t demand a stop, a lecture and another excuse for eating.

Viard makes Jacques the epitome of the cheerfully suave Frenchman: an unapologetic sybarite whom Anne — polite to the core — has no desire to offend. On top of which, she definitely enjoys the attention, and Jacques’ repeated insistence that she should indulge herself. Where’s the harm?

Batman V Superman: Clash of titans

Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) • View trailer 
Three stars. Rated PG-13, and somewhat generously, for brief sensuality and relentless, soul-crushing violence
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 3.25.16

A perceptive philosophical theme serves as this film’s beating heart, a tenet that — quite sadly — reflects these cynical and despondent times: that, just as we worship our heroes, we’re all too eager to tear them down.

Alexander Luthor (Jesse Eisenberg, center) is delighted to discover that the guests at his
high-society event include inquisitive Daily Planet reporter Clark Kent (Henry Cavill, left)
and fellow industrialist Bruce Wayne (Ben Affleck). But why are they present?

Because we’re also jealous, and more than a little fearful. Because such individuals are different than you and I.

The “Big Blue” standing as the moral centerpiece of Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice couldn’t be more different than the cheerful, easily admired boy scout played by Christopher Reeve in his quartet of films, several decades and a tidal shift of public sentiment ago. This 21st century Superman exists in a mutinous, resentful America that mirrors our own today, with a populous eager to be suspicious of any “alien” floating amongst us.

The resulting film is grim, its tone unrelentingly melancholy, its subtext downright depressing: We clearly don’t deserve a Superman.

For longtime comic book fans, the irony is palpable. Back in the early 1960s, DC Comics’ stable of heroes — Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman et al — were colorful but simplistic champions who routinely, almost casually, defeated equally flamboyant villains in self-contained storylines that mirrored popular TV dramas that did the same: all problems solved in one quick read (or one quick hour), and then on to the next adventure, perhaps with a quip or two. Nobody ever changed, because nobody had anything approaching an actual personality.

Upstart Marvel Comics upended this one-dimensional formula with its eye-opening roster of angst-laden superheroes. When out of their costumes, Spiderman, Iron Man, the Fantastic Four and their brethren felt like the folks next door, complete with anxieties and ground-level responsibilities. Their clashes with bad guys often occurred over multiple-issue story arcs: the outcomes less definitive, and often tinged with regret.

How interesting, then, that these two companies have switched roles en route to big-screen domination. Even at their most dire, Marvel movies are fun, their cataclysmic events leavened with an engaging layer of droll humor: a wink and nudge established the first time Robert Downey Jr. donned his Iron Man togs.

Trumbo: The writer as triumphant gadfly

Trumbo(2015) • View trailer 
Four stars. Rated R, for profanity and coarse sexual candor
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 12.4.15

You have to love ironic serendipity.

When Trumbo was scripted, and then green-lighted for production, and then filmed — with much of its dialog lifted directly from legendary Hollywood screenwriter Dalton Trumbo’s actual speeches and testimony, and delivered so superbly by star Bryan Cranston — nobody could have anticipated that this impeccably mounted and rigorously authentic drama would be released just as our country is poised to repeat the same ghastly mistake made with Japanese American citizens during World War II, and the so-called “Communist sympathizers” who were blacklisted during the 1950s.

Packed tightly into a movie theater filled with eager patrons, Dalton Trumbo (Bryan Cranston)
and his wife, Cleo (Diane Lane), await the film's all-important credits.

One of whom — Trumbo — is the subject of director Jay Roach’s heartfelt and thoroughly mesmerizing film.

Mesmerizing for two reasons: because of scripter John McNamara’s skillful adaptation of veteran journalist Bruce Cook’s 1976 biography, written with Trumbo’s full cooperation; and because of Cranston’s richly nuanced portrayal of the feisty novelist, screenwriter and social agitator.

No question: Trumbo was a character, and Cranston captures the famed scribe’s numerous eccentricities, righteous indignation and insufferable idealism. Trumbo fought the good fight, and lived to talk about it; his thorn-in-the-side persistence — assisted, at just the right moment, by a few Hollywood heavyweights — helped break the blacklist, and put an end to the ultimately ineffectual scare-mongering tactics that emanated from the House Un-American Activities Committee.

Roach and McNamara re-create this shameful bit of American history with the same darkly droll tinge of humor with which Trumbo peppered both his casual conversation and his screenplays. Actually, that’s an misstatement; Trumbo’s conversation rarely was casual, and Cranston gleefully chews into McNamara’s dialog — and Trumbo’s own words — with the enthusiasm of a hyena tearing at a carcass.

We’ve been down this road before, notably with 1976’s The Front — made with numerous individuals, both in front of and behind the camera, who had been smeared by the blacklist — 1991’s Guilty by Suspicion and 2005’s Good Night, and Good Luck.

The latter was highlighted by David Strathairn’s eerily authentic portrayal of broadcast journalist Edward R. Murrow. Cranston takes a slightly different approach with Trumbo, nailing the man’s behavior and wonderfully rich verbal vitriol, without really trying to imitate him. As easily observed in the period photos and news clips that appear during the closing credits, Cranston doesn’t really look much like Trumbo.

By my, he sure sounds and acts like him.

Inside Out: An animated masterpiece

Inside Out (2015) • View trailer 
Five stars. Rated G, and suitable for all ages
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.19.15

Sheer genius.

After stalling a bit in recent years, Pixar has reclaimed its throne of brilliance, thanks to the impressively imaginative Inside Out, one of the most entertaining and ingenious metaphors ever brought to the big screen.

Joy, right, is horrified to discover that a mere touch from Sadness can transform a yellow
sphere — representing a happy memory — into one of sorrow. What will this do to the
long-term memories carefully stored within their host little girl's mind?

Mind you, it’s not that Cars 2, Monsters University and Brave were bad films; far from it. But they were disappointing nonetheless: the first two driven more by merchandising and less by a heartfelt reason to continue their storylines, as was realized far better by the Toy Story trilogy. More to the point, all three recent films lacked the inspirational, outside-the-box snap, crackle and pop that has characterized so many of Pixar’s efforts.

It’s their own fault, really: Set the bar high, and fans arrive with expectations.

All of which are met, and then some, by the wonderful Inside Out. By turns exhilarating, wildly euphoric and poignant, this modern-day fairy tale offers perceptive insight into how (and why) we deal with love, happiness, family ties, crushing disappointments and all sorts of routine daily successes and failures, along with a rather droll suggestion of what might be happening when our lives feel “out of balance.”

Director Pete Docter (Monsters, Inc. and Up) concocted a strikingly savvy premise, then shaped it into a thoroughly engaging script with co-writers Josh Cooley and Meg LeFauve. In a way, it’s the Monsters, Inc. concept writ much larger: Instead of merely establishing a reason for nightmares, Docter & Co. have built an entire fantastical explanation for all human behavior.

In short, we’re governed by an uneasy alliance between five key emotions — Joy, Fear, Anger, Sadness and Disgust — which take turns operating  a complex control center within our minds. Too much of any one emotion results in instability, manifested in the outer “real” world by bewildering (to others) behavior.

But it’s much, much deeper than that, as gradually revealed in the charming saga of  Riley, whom we first meet as a gurgling infant born to her delighted mother (voiced by Diane Lane) and father (Kyle MacLachlan). As she’s delivered into the world, Riley’s mind receives its first emotion: Joy (Amy Poehler), awestruck by what she sees “through” her infant host’s eyes.

Joy is further surprised by the creation and immediate storage of the baby’s first memory, wrapped in a protective, bowling ball-sized soft yellow sphere: the color of Joy herself.

But infant frustration quickly follows, cueing the arrival of Anger (Lewis Black); he’s soon joined by Fear (Bill Hader), Sadness (Phyllis Smith) and Disgust (Mindy Kaling). Over time, as Riley (now voiced by Kaitlyn Dias) grows into a rambunctious adolescent — encouraged to do so by her doting parents — her myriad memory spheres are predominantly yellow ... because what is childhood, if not a period of great joy?

But matters are destined to get more complicated.

Man of Steel: Dull as iron

Man of Steel (2013) • View trailer 
Three stars. Rating: PG-13, for brief profanity and vicious, unrelenting violence and destruction
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 6.14.13

Grim, humorless and unpleasantly brutal.

Not to mention boring and redundant, particularly during the interminable, body-slamming final act.

No fun at all.

Having been punched through half a dozen buildings by an equally super-powered
adversary, our caped hero (Henry Cavill) pauses for breath before returning to the
city-leveling skirmish. At which point, we wonder: With a hero like this, who
needs enemies?

Director Zack Snyder has delivered a Superman film with the nasty, cataclysmic tone he employed so well — and much more appropriately — in 300 and Watchman: a dark, dour mood that also suited Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, but is wholly out of place here. No surprise: Nolan shares story credit here with David S. Goyer, with whom he co-wrote those Batman epics. All things considered, then, Snyder, Nolan and Goyer have concocted precisely the sort of Superman we should have expected from them.

I do not approve.

All concerned desperately need to take lessons from Joss Whedon, when it comes to choreographing the real estate-leveling carnage of a melee between super-powered beings. As Whedon proved with The Avengers, he understands the importance of the occasional wink and nod, not to mention his recognition of the fine emotional line between necessary collateral damage and a callous disregard for brutalized civilian bystanders.

Snyder obviously relished the opportunity to envision what it really might be like for a being such as Superman to be tossed through half a mile’s worth of office buildings; the director and his special-effects wizards certainly beat such scenes to death. But, speaking of death, it’s impossible to overlook the hundreds (thousands?) of fragile humans who’d be maimed and killed along the way, as a result of each super-powered punch ... which turns Superman’s “code against killing” into something of a joke.

Hell, he must kill scores of people every time he slams his evil, super-powered adversaries through said buildings. Ironic, then, that his code eventually becomes an important — if ill-defined — plot point.

On top of which, the various Metropolis-shattering skirmishes go on for so long, and thus to such diminishing returns, that they become no more meaningful than watching Godzilla stomp and flatten a miniature cardboard Tokyo in all those 1950s and ’60s Japanese monster flicks.

Secretariat: Merely a trot

Secretariat (2010) • View trailer for Secretariat

3.5 stars (out of five) • Rated PG

By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 10.08.10
Buy DVD: Secretariat • Buy Blu-Ray: Secretariat [Blu-ray]

Secretariat's place in horse-racing history remains the stuff of legend, and perhaps the only true surprise revolving around this inspirational drama concerns why almost four decades passed before it was filmed.

The bare-bones details are amazing, both as they relate to Secretariat himself — the champion with the disconcerting habit of charging last out of the starting gate, as if delighted by the chance to tease all the hopeful punters — and to Penny Chenery Tweedy, the "Denver housewife" who took such massive financial risks in order to nurture the four-legged friend she so strongly believed in.

Penny Chenery Tweedy (Diane Lane, left), Miss Ham
(Margo Martindale) and trainer Lucien Laurin (John
Malkovich) watch nervously as Secretariat approaches
the starting gate; a lot rides on this race, not the least
of which is Penny's ability to save the family farm.
Gosh, it's a Disney film; whaddya think is gonna happen?

And, no question, this film's third act builds viewers into a state of nervous anticipation, even though the outcome is well known all these years later. Real-world horses don't become cinema stars unless they've done something pretty extraordinary, so only very young viewers are apt to wonder whether Secretariat really will win the fabled Triple Crown.

The race footage hits all the right notes, and it's certainly OK if you want to cheer; director Randall Wallace obviously intends just such a reaction.

But that manipulative touch gets a bit irritating, as well. Wallace's film bears the stamp of the hyper-sanitized Disney corporate approach, and all the elements are just a bit too exaggerated. Diane Lane's performance as Penny makes the woman just this side of angelic; John Malkovich's handling of veteran trainer Lucien Laurin tries too hard for eccentric comic relief; Penny's prickly issues with her husband (Dylan Walsh, as Jack) and brother (Dylan Baker, as Hollis) — neither of whom supports her risk-taking madness — miraculously vanish just in time for the final race.

Nights in Rodanthe: Contrived nonsense

Nights in Rodanthe (2008) • View trailer for Nights in Rodanthe
Three stars (out of five). Rating: PG-13, and quite needlessly, for mild sensuality
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.25.08
Buy DVD: Nights in Rodanthe • Buy Blu-Ray: Nights in Rodanthe (+ BD-Live) [Blu-ray]


Full disclosure time:

I'm a hard-core romantic and a sucker for sweet little love stories; were it not for light-hearted caper thrillers — absolutely my favorite genre — starry-eyed melodramas would occupy the No. 1 spot.

Dr. Paul Flanner (Richard Gere), having traveled to North Carolina's Outer
Banks during the off-season, for a supremely uncomfortable personal errand,
doesn't wish to eat alone at the inn managed by Adrienne Willis (Diane Lane);
he therefore brings his dinner into the kitchen and joins her. It's a cute, gently
flirtatious scene; sadly, the rest of the film can't match its charm.

And I'm absolutely equal-opportunity; I don't care whether the equation's two halves are a guy and a gal, two members of the same gender, mismatched robots or cowboy string-dolls named Woody and Jessie. As long as they fall into each other's arms as the final act concludes — or we know they will — I'm a happy camper.

Shirley MacLaine's sidelong demand that Jack Lemmon "Shut up and deal," at the end of 1960's The Apartment, is one of the greatest — and most romantic — closing lines ever written for a film.

I mention all this by way of demonstrating that I am, quite clearly, part of the target audience for director George C. Wolfe's adaptation of Nights in Rodanthe, scripted by Ann Peacock and John Romano, and based on the novel by Nicholas Sparks.

But despite my genre willingness, this flick did nothing for me.

Sparks, frequently courted by Hollywood, has a tendency to ladle his melodrama with a trowel; the films adapted from his overly contrived novels often suffer from the same disease.

Sparks' characters don't just suffer; they endure the overwhelming mental anguish of the damned.

It might work on the printed page, but selling such purple melodrama on the big screen depends on the acting talent involved.

Kevin Costner spent all of 1998's dreary and laughably improbable Message in a Bottle looking for character motivation.

2002's A Walk to Remember — despite the sympathetic treatment of its religious protagonist — was little more than a hiccup in Mandy Moore's slow rise up Hollywood's ladder of fame.

The Notebook, depending on your tolerance for such stuff, was either too maudlin for words or too sad to endure, although it certainly boasted a strong cast.

Which brings us to Nights in Rodanthe, which gets some of its notoriety for once again re-uniting stars Richard Gere and Diane Lane, who struck reasonably tragic sparks in Unfaithful, and first worked together all the way back in The Cotton Club.

Lane can act — quite well, in fact — and she pulls off this story's tougher scenes.

Gere cannot, and does not.

Untraceable: Unwatchable

Untraceable (2008) • View trailer
No stars (turkey). Rating: R, for profanity and excruciating, exploitative violence and torture
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 1.31.08

The trouble with culturing a disease is that the little buggers inevitably escape the petri dish.

Horror films are designed to be outrageous; they cater to a specific viewership that worships at the alter of torture-porn slime such as the Hostel and Saw series.

FBI cybercrime special agent Jennifer Marsh (Diane Lane, center) and Portland
police detective Eric Box (Billy Burke, far right) watch in horror, along with
the rest of Marsh's colleagues, as another poor victim is tortured to death on a
Web site run by a tech-savvy Internet predator.

Indeed, it could be argued that horror films — like any other aspect of youth culture — aren't doing their job unless they offend and otherwise dismay mainstream society.

It's an entirely different matter, however, when such reprehensible garbage oozes from the fringe element and emerges with a deceptive outer layer of respectable clothing, designed specifically to entice the unwary.

In the case of Untraceable, the respectable clothing is worn by star Diane Lane, a veteran actress with a long list of credits stretching back to The Outsiders and The Cotton Club, who more recently copped an Oscar nomination for Unfaithful and indulged her romantic side in Under the Tuscan Sun.

Her presence here adds bogus legitimacy to an otherwise worthless piece of trash from a director — Gregory Hoblit — determined to rub our noses in precisely the sort of ghastly, grisly mayhem that has become de rigueur in horror flicks such as those cited above.

To call Untraceable tasteless is the worst of understatements.

Mainstream cop thrillers should be able to survive on tension and character development, and in fairness scripter Robert Fyvolent tries to get some juice going between FBI cybercrime special agent Jennifer Marsh (Lane) and police detective Eric Box (Billy Burke, wholly unmemorable). But Lane and Burke have zero chemistry ... or maybe it's just that Hoblit couldn't be bothered to encourage them to create any.

The story is a sadistic blend of cyber wizardry and old-fashioned mechanical torture. A deranged wing nut — Joseph Cross, as Owen Reilly — sets up a Web site with streaming video of an escalating series of murders-in-progress.

He starts with a kitten but quickly escalates to people, and the gimmick is that the various death traps are controlled by the number of viewers who log into the site: The more lookie-loos, the faster the victim dies.